


Resident Enis: Truth and Legend

by the_angst_alchemist



Series: Resident Enis: Untold Stories [7]
Category: Random Encounters: Resident Enis (Web Series)
Genre: Backstory, Canonical Character Death, Cute Ending, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Legends, M/M, Mark and Enis working together, Past Character Death, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 09:51:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11529774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_angst_alchemist/pseuds/the_angst_alchemist
Summary: Certain things can keep people trying. For instance, Mark and Dodger's dream.





	Resident Enis: Truth and Legend

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Silvia_Phenora](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silvia_Phenora/gifts).



Enis was never one to talk about himself when he was a human. After all, that was ages ago; he couldn't even remember what he looked like in a mirror or what his sister's voice sounded like. His past was an awkward silent movie that he couldn't rewatch.  
And each day he wasn't at the mansion was another day he felt like he was betraying his family.  
Mark and Dodger couldn't understand his desperation to stay away from other vampires, how he had somehow paled around them. After all, they didn't know. He had memories, dim memories, of thinking that vampires were just soulless monsters who benefited from being killed with a silver bullet to the head or a wooden stake to the heart.  
They didn't know that. And he didn't want them to.  
He clutched the book close as they ran away again, forcing their feet to crash into rocks and dirt and muck and sand. They didn't have a chance to stop, running from the vampire village, until finally Mark allowed them to.  
Something seemed to have made his usually pessimistic attitude flip around, as he gave the others a grin as he brought back firewood, humming a tune one time and nearly dancing the next. Something, something that Enis didn't know.  
"We're gonna do this, and then the world's gonna be a good place," Mark stated over the crackling of the campfire.  
"Do what?" Enis asked, hoping to get a straight answer. For a change, Mark didn't avoid the question.  
"There's a legend 'bout an artifact you can use to fix the world. Make all the monsters back into humans. Make all of them... Not cannibals, not vampires, not werewolves. It'll save everyone from their curses. We'll all be people. And then we can work together and rebuild a society where we aren't trying to kill each other, or steal--"  
"Unless we have to!" Dodger pointed out.  
"--or ever go hungry. People can do what they're good at. We'll all survive together..!" Mark grinned at Enis. "And you and me and Dodger, we'll get to do what we want. Go back to the mansion and throw open the doors. Go make our own town and our own lives... Something. Whatever we choose to, not what he have to."  
Enis smiled at the thought. "And... And no one can tell us what not to do or punish us?"  
"Well, not until we get laws and stuff. We'll make sure it's fair--"  
"Like 'steal a cookie and you're grounded for a week' sort of things?"  
"...That's definitely not fair, Enis."  
"Huh..."  
Dodger and Mark looked at him, but Enis seemed unfazed. If anything, he was slightly confused with them.  
"Where would you get that idea from?"  
"That was the law back in my house. Until we stopped having cookies at all... And--" he cut himself off. It wasn't the time to tell them. "But anyways! What else would you do?"  
"Well... Can't daydream too much anymore. Dave and I always used to play a game of topping each other when we couldn't sleep," Dodger admitted. "Mark was always busy trying to find the fragments."  
"There was this book about it-- Well, two, but I believed the one in the kid's nonfiction back then... Didn't look much at the adult one. It had a riddle on where to find them, too.  
"'One will be in the forest of green.  
The forest of wind and without any trees.  
One will be in the glen, the valley of thieves  
For which it is named and will never retreat.  
One in the volcano, long since gone to sleep  
The part lies in wait in the crater's hidden deeps.  
One on the beach, covered in caves.  
The part will be found hidden from the waves.  
Use them at the top of the tower to the sky,  
And the monsters around will never be nigh.'"  
There was a pause.  
"So you DO like to read!" Enis exclaimed. Mark turned a shade of red not even a two-year-old's drawing of fire could match, and Dodger couldn't help but laugh.  
"Well, I do sometimes, when it's useful, but... Well. Dodger and I met Dave and the others in a library. We were a huge group of messed up kids without families, her holding a baseball bat and covered in blood, me holding onto a wooden plank and covered in soot... We weren't the best looking bunch. But the older kids told us their plans and went off, leaving younger ones like Dave and us. So we made a team, found a plan of our own, and went out once we were ready. We were barely teens, I think. But Dodger was the best thief around, Dave could talk his way in and out of anything, and I was the most determined guy we had.  
"So we went off after a legend and ended up finding nothing. We couldn't even find our way back to the library, so we kept going. Running. That verse was all we had."  
Mark sighed at the fire.  
"And then we met you, and I almost forgot about it altogether. But... Yeah. Now you know. You in?"  
Enis looked at him and smiled.  
"Sounds like an adventure!"  
Mark pulled out a map from the bag that he carried, holding it down with some nearby rocks. "So. We need to find those places. A forest without trees... A glen named after thieves... A volcano that's been dormant... A beach with a bunch of caves... And a sky tower."  
"Wellllll... This could be the beach!" Enis pointed to a place called "West Beach", but Mark shook his head.  
"We checked. No caves."  
"What about here!" he pointed to another one, nearby enough that they could walk given a few days.  
"I'll mark it down as a maybe. Sunrise Beach... Got it." Mark wrote on his hand using some soot from the ground. He almost had to stretch to get it from near the fire.  
Enis didn't bother himself with that fact, though. He was looking for a forest without trees. "Green... Forest without tree--A field!" Enis grinned. "A forest of grass!"  
"Smart. Now find one on this mess..."  
The pair kept searching as Dodger eventually made a little shelter and fell asleep inside. The fire crackled heartily beside them as they searched for each, pointing to candidates.  
It was like magic in the air to see Mark grin like that. Enis looked up at him, but Mark was too focused on the map.  
He was stunning in the low firelight and with such a smile on his face. While usually his black hair was dyed red in the front using a recent kill, his hair had faded from their long walk. Even though he looked hardly twenty-five, he already had grey hairs sneaking through from stress.  
Enis could hardly breathe.  
But Mark didn't even notice.  
He finally folded up the map, brushed the hair out of his face, and pushed the map back into the bag. "That was great, Enis. Thanks for the help."  
"Thank you" was all Enis could think to say in response.  
Mark pulled out a blanket from the sack, then another. Only two. After a moment, he laid it out on the ground, then the other on top. He moved the supply bag to the top.  
"It's kinda chilly tonight..." Mark noted aloud. As if he was avoiding something. Dodger sighed in her sleep, as if telling him to get on with it. Mark rubbed the back of his neck. "...Are vampires really always cold?"  
"Well... Usually? I mean, we're warm if we just drank..."  
"Alright." Mark looked at Dodger, then at Enis. "How much control do you have over how much you drink, Enis?"  
"...Some? I mean, unless I'm hungry, I can control it, but--"  
"So if need be, Dodger and I could sustain you. Correct?"  
"...No. I wouldn't hurt you two. You're my family now."  
Mark almost visibly winced.  
"Enis. Don't... Don't use that word. Families burn and break and die around people like us. Mine, Dodger's, Dave's... All died. You... You had a well-off family. They probably protected you."  
Enis nearly laughed.  
"If by protected you mean tried to get me killed, then sure, Father protected me, alright..."  
"And what about your mother?"  
"Turned, then killed. No tolerance, Father said."  
They fell silent for a moment.  
"Do you want to share a d*mn blanket or not?" Mark finally asked. "If you prefer, go ahead and sleep on top, if you aren't cold--"  
Enis cut him off.  
"Of course, Mark." He grinned, and Mark laid down under the blanket, Enis joining him quickly, each facing away.  
"...G'night, Enis."  
"Good night, Mark!" Enis replied, picking up the book and resting his head on that. At least that way, it might be safe.

There was plenty of grumbling about "Enis having cold hands" and "Mark moving around too much" in the morning, but they were nothing but grumbles.  
They had a plan.  
Finally.  
They had each other.  
Always.  
They could save the world.  
Maybe.


End file.
